2009 Relief Sale

Last Saturday was the annual Michiana Mennonite Relief Sale, which starts on Friday evening with an open house and lots of eating, following by Saturday with more eating and maybe some buying. I like to call it "gluttony for the poor" since there is always so much good food to eat, and all the proceeds are for a good cause - Mennonite Central Committee. As in past years, I helped out in the registration building on Saturday morning for a few hours, giving out auction buyer numbers for the three big auctions - antique, quilt, and new & used. One thing they did different this year was they actually let a few non-food things be sold already on Friday evening, including plants and crafts. I think this helped them to not have some things left over on Saturday afternoon. The weather started out cool and drizzly but the rain stopped and it turned into a nice fall day.

My friend Susie giving out a bidder number.

Penny Power totals. Churches were encouraged to donate their spare change to support the clean water projects for MCC. When I took this picture, they have raised over $15,000 from coins!

Carla whipping up some apple fritters.

The food tent.

At the quilt auction.

A big crowd at the quilt auction.

The relief sale usually raises about $350,000. They were a little worried about how this year would turn out with the down economy, but things seemed to go well.